Enjoy accurate acoustics with this Sonos One speaker. It connects to your home Wi-Fi network to stream digital music, and has Amazon Alexa built-in for hands-free voice control of your music and other apps.

Best Speaker with Voice Assist

Hello Everyone
The negative reviews are a bit over zealous IMO. Sonos advised of the Sonos One limitations at launch with promises to add more music services and voice assists in the coming months. One also has to assume that commands will improve as well.
I own both the Echo Dot and Google Home and both are finicky at times. Nuf said on that so here's my impression of the Sonos One.
I picked -up my pair of Sonos One's on release date 10/24/17. I'm a current user of Sonos products (i.e. Play 5_2nd Gen x 2 / Play 3 x2 / Play 1 x 2 / Sub x 2 / Sound Bar / Boost / Connect x 2).
I provided my equipment information to qualify my statement that setup of the Sonos One's was very easy; as quite a few pre-release reviews indicated that setup was rather involved. I didn't find that to be the case and that's probably due to my familiarity with Sonos speakers and accessories.
That said…for those of you considering buying the Sonos One as your first Sonos product here are a few tips:
(1) Download the Alexa App first and setup your account. By doing so, setting up Alexa in the Sonos One will go a lot smoother.
(2) Download the Sonos App (it won't recognize anything until you plug-in the Sonos One)
(3) If you are going to setup The Sonos One as a wireless speaker (not connected via Ethernet) be sure that your routers 2.4Ghz band is broadcasting; as Sonos products prefer it.
(4) If you have a weak Wi-Fi signal (reference where you are setting up the Sonos One) you may want to consider incorporating the Sonos Boost ($99) and using the Sonos Mesh network.
(5) Visit the Sonos website for great information on how-to's for wired, Wi-Fi and Boost setup
(6) Assuming you’ve passed Sonos Setup 101_you’re ready to begin setting up your Sonos One speaker(s).
(7) Plug in your Sonos One (or both if you have two and intend using them as a Stereo pair), open the Sonos App and follow instructions.
(8) After setting up the speaker(s)…Setup Alexa!
Here's what I found setting up the Sonos One's in stereo pair…
Alexa will respond over the speaker you are standing the closest too (left or right). When standing center Alexa in my tests defaulted to the left speaker.
I have Google Home connected to my Play 5’s via line-in over Chrome Cast. Interestingly when the Sonos One’s are Grouped to a speaker or speakers in another room the Sonos One will pause and stop music via Alexa even though it was initiated via Google Home. You can learn about Grouping on the Sonos website.
As with my Sonos Play 1’s music on the Sonos One’s sounds great if not slightly better (probably just my wishful thinking). Alexa aside the Sonos One performs with the same functionality as the Play 1 in every aspect which is really no surprise. All Alexa features worked as they should (I had an Echo Dot prior to the Sonos One).
The market that Sonos pioneered is getting more competitive every day. Comparatively speaking there are probably better speakers sonically on the market as well. However, if Sonos keeps their promise (and they usually do) to add more features in the coming months for music choices and voice assistants...the Sonos One IMO will be the best wireless speaker on the market at its size and price point.
Just FYI, I sold my three (3) year old pair of Sonos Play 1's for 67.5% of the original cost before tax. Not bad considering the Sonos One does not bond with a Sonos Play 1 (at least not today)

I would recommend this to a friend

Sorry, there was a problem. Please try again later.

Jinxxy

Verified Purchase

Elite Plus Member

Rating: 2 out of 5 stars

2

Excellent smart speaker BUT...

Posted 3 days ago

Jinxxy

Verified Purchase

Elite Plus Member

I was gifted the Sonos One Black for Christmas. Personally I'm not a huge fan of Alexa.. I would much rather have Google assistant but overall the setup was easy and the sound was fantastic. I know it's an Amazon supported device so it would obviously default to playing Amazon Music but I thought it was unfortunate that I couldn't use voice commands to have it play from my Google Play Music library. That was ok though since I could still play from Google Music through the Sonos app- I just had to do it manually rather than voice commands.
Since this was a Christmas gift I exchanged it for a Sonos One White and that's when everything went downhill. If we had only purchased this black speaker I would have happily given it 4 stars (-1 just for the stuff listed above) but my experience is with the Sonos One overall so I'll tell you what happened with the Sonos One white.
(Before starting the installation process for the white speaker I removed both Sonos and Alexa apps from my phone to reinstall)
1. From the beginning said that the speaker was already setup and wouldn't allow us to join. Had to do a hard reset right out of the box.
2. When I tried to pair the speaker to my network it wouldn't find my network.. My router was across the room- 20 ft away. Then it wouldn't accept my password that my husband and I both typed it even though it was correct.
3. After failed attempts it said for me to connect to a temporary network called SONOS that the speaker created. I checked 3x and on the 3rd attempt it was there. It then asked for me to enter my router password again which it would not accept.
4. It finally directed me to plug in an Ethernet cord- the direct link worked and I was able to "complete" the configuration. I say "complete" because I technically had a speaker but it didn't function properly...
5. I added Google Music and Amazon Music to the Sonos speaker and went through the Alexa setup, but when I would asked Alexa to play music it would says "unable to play ___ music- go to Alexa app -> skills -> add Sonos and than ask Alexa to search for all devices"... OKAY. so I read multiple trouble shooting possibilities last night from making sure my location was correct, to uninstalling and reinstalling alexa, etc. Under skills Sonos was listed (I removed and re-added and that didn't help) so I asked Alexa to search for devices (which I didn't have any other then this one speaker) so she said no other devices found.. So, rinse and repeat, I asked several more times for her to play music.. to only be told the same message about going into Alexa -> skills -> blah blah blah.
6. so I decided to log into my husbands amazon account instead of mine to see if that would work. That resolved the issue with the above message but created a new issue. The new issue was that I would ask Alexa to play music and it would say "Ok, playing Christmas music from iHeart radio". I don't have iHeart radio.. nor have I ever used it. I never downloaded it to the Sonos app and I quadruple checked the Alexa app to make sure that under Music -> the default music service selected was Amazon music NOT iHeart radio yet it would still say "playing music from iHeart radio" when given a command and than there would be silence.. (probably because I didn't have iHeart radio....)
After over an hour to 2 hours trying to get this speaker set up and playing music we gave up. I could not find any troubleshooting for an issue like this on the web so my husband ended up returning it to Best Buy today. I have mixed feelings whether I would recommend this product. Personally I would want to get another one (assuming the white one just had some sort of malfunction) but after having two, one that was excellent and the other that we returned I'd say there's a 50/50 chance of getting one that works from my experience. :/ Very dissatisfied with those odds.
an Ethernet cord from my router.. The direct link worked and it then said it was going to make it's own network connection called SONOS to connect to under WiFi on my phone.. 2 out of the 3 times I searched nothing showed up and on the 3rd attempt it was there.

No, I would not recommend this to a friend

Sorry, there was a problem. Please try again later.

LikeStuff

Verified Purchase

Elite Member

Rating: 2 out of 5 stars

2

Good Sound but Major Flaw w/ Amazon Music

I purchased to replace a first generation Amazon Echo that I mainly use to play music, control a few devices, maintain a shopping list and to assist with measurements and questions around the kitchen.
First the positive, the Sonos, as expected, has very good sound, especially when compared to the original Echo. It has good bass and clarity for its size. The initial setup, while a little convoluted with having to jump between apps, was fairly straight forward, just make sure to follow the directions exactly. After the setup, Alexa was working fine, controlling my Philips Hue lights, Wemo switches, Nest thermostat, Logitech Harmony. Everything worked, much to my relief given some of the issues noted in other reviews.
My main use is to play music via Amazon Music, which typically is a great experience with Alexa. However, this is where my problems began. I asked Alexa to play my music and it started playing, but then it stopped after one song. I tried again and again, it stopped after one or two songs. After experimenting, I has several issues with playing via Alexa on Amazon Music. Sometimes, it would stop after one, two or three songs, sometimes it would try to play and I hear a little static, and then nothing, sometimes in transition, it cuts the song short and jumps to next song, but always, never plays more than a few songs when Alexa is used to start the music. I initially set it up on wifi, but then switched to ethernet in case it was interference, but that didn't solve it. I saw in the Sonos community forum that removing the device and Sonos skill and adding back resolved it for some, but not everyone and it didn't work for me. This was also a bit confusing given the Amazon Alexa did not allow me to remove the device and I had to use a browser. I also tried a factory reset, but the problem still persisted. I tried resetting my router, but that didn't help either. Next I also tried playing Amazon Music through the Sonos app and it works just fine, it only has problems when it's started by Alexa. I tried streaming from iHeart Radio and Pandora via Alexa and those seem to also work just fine. It's only Amazon Music that won't work correctly with Alexa. Looking on the forums, it seems to be a common problem. Given it's Amazon Music, hard to say if it's a Sonos problem or an Amazon problem. I'm hoping there's a quick software fix, else will need to decide whether to return and go back to the Echo or perhaps an Echo Dot connected to a good speaker.

No, I would not recommend this to a friend

Sorry, there was a problem. Please try again later.

MAtt2h

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

3

Overrated and buggy

Posted 3 months ago

MAtt2h

It's a nice speaker but ultimately I would recommend purchasing an Echo Dot and connecting it to good speakers instead. There are too many bugs to make this overrated, mediocre speaker worthwhile. People rave about its sound quality. I don't see what all the fuss is about. It has good bass but there's also kind of a strange flatness and overclarity to it that's hard to describe.
Some things I liked: Sleek design, Bass and Treble Control, Supposed availability of more smart assistants than Alexa at some point in the future
Some things I didn't:
- Alexa voice control is buggy. If content is playing, more often than not the speaker will not be able to hear you. Amazon's native Echo devices perform much better at this task.
- There are little bugs with playback. For example, ask Alexa to play your flash briefing and it starts playing the flash briefing content in the background immediately, even while it's still saying, "Okay, here's your flash briefing." Amazon's Alexa devices do not do this. The Sonos One is also more prone to hearing its own wake word and going into a feedback loop.
- Spotify via Alexa on Sonos One is useless. It cannot start in shuffle mode and it cannot shuffle a playlist of more than a couple dozen songs due to the fact that it's using something called Spotify Connect to load a queue of songs in the background. If I say, Alexa shuffle my Starred playlist (my master playlist), it always starts playing the same song - the first song on the list - and even when I do get it to shuffle, it keeps playing the same 50 songs or so. It's enormously frustrating. You can shuffle Spotify music using the Sonos app on your phone, but then what's the point of having a voice-assistant speaker?
- No bluetooth. I let myself be convinced that a speaker with Wifi connectivity only would meet all of my needs. It didn't. You can only stream to your speaker from apps that support wifi streaming.
- There are several things that Alexa devices can do that Sonos cannot, including "drop in" mode, messaging, and calling.
- The visual ring around the Alexa devices just gives those devices a level of personality, interactivity, and fun that the Sonos One, with its (admittedly perfectly pleasant) audible recognition tone does not really have.
- They've been promising Google Assistant integration for a long time and it still hasn't come to be.
- You cannot take advantage of the TruePlay tuning feature that customizes the speaker to the acoustic properties of your room unless you have an Apple device. They don't mention that in their marketing materials. Android people, go . yourselves.
- Sound quality is good but by no means transcendent. Expected more given the hype. I can only conclude that this is an overpriced hipster product.

No, I would not recommend this to a friend

Sorry, there was a problem. Please try again later.

Jinxxy

Verified Purchase

Elite Plus Member

Rating: 1 out of 5 stars

1

What a headache.

My husband bought me a Sonos One in black- the setup was SO smooth.. it took about 15 minutes at most to get everything setup and able to listen to music. The sound was fantastic though even at Level 1 for volume it was pretty loud. Still the overall sound quality was amazing. But, I'm picky and since it was a Christmas gift I wanted the Sonos One White b/c I thought it would cosmetically stand out more amongst my other electronics. So I exchanged the Sonos One black for the white speaker and IT CAUSED NOTHING BUT A HEADACHE.
I think I wasted over an hour of my life trying to get that darn speaker to work. I removed the Sonos app and Alexa apps from my phone and reinstalled but my phone and the speaker wouldn't link up.. than it wouldn't connect to my network and I had to use an Ethernet to complete the configuration. I made sure that Alexa was installed and that my default music was selected and tried to give her a command to play music.. I kept getting a message that I had to go into Alexa -> skils -> add sonos to be able to play music. I did just that... SEVERAL TIMES and Sonos was added in Alexa but Alexa was not recognizing that. Finally after logging out of my amazon account and back in 3-4x I was able to have her stop responding about needing to add the Sonos Skill in her app but instead it would try and pull music from iHeart radio. ie. Alexa play Xmas music-- which she would respond "playing Xmas music from iHeart radio". Since I did not have iheart radio setup or even an account for it, no music would play (I never added iheart radio in the Sonos app and I checked the default music source in the Alexa app and Amazon Music was selected). Since it was already set to Amazon Music as default and was trying to play iHeart radio it was getting us no where. We could go into Amazon Music and Google Music from the Sonos app on our phones and play music from selecting it there but the Alexa voice commands would not work. After several hours and a complete headache, we decided to box the Sonos One back up and return it the next day. Very disappointed that I ever took the black Sonos One back.

No, I would not recommend this to a friend

Sorry, there was a problem. Please try again later.

opher

Verified Purchase

Member

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

5

Love it

Posted 3 weeks ago

opher

Verified Purchase

Member

Purchased this a few weeks ago now and am planning to purchase another shortly.
This was my first Sonos product and honestly I am blown away by their build, sound, and feature quality. Starting off with the unboxing, it could be a little nicer for the price of a spearker - but that's nit picking.. once out of the box you can immediately feel the quality of the product in your hand. It feels solid, weighted properly, not too heavy but noticeably sturdy. The feel is also very high quality. The touch features on the top are a little hard to see at times but once you get use to it that isn't a problem.. and honestly with Alexa installed I hardly find myself using the touch feature at all.
Installation was a breeze, I connected the power and ethernet cables, downloaded the sonos app, created an account, connected and registered my device, and it was ready to use.
The sound quality is deep and full of rich tones. I do not find myself missing any high or low notes.
If you plan to use Alexa you will need to also download the Amazon Alexa app and create an account for that as well, this allows you to connect your Sonos One with other Alexa enabled devices in your home, like an echo. Connecting to other devices is also a breeze and you can communicate between them without any issues.
The Sonos application is honestly the shortfall of the whole experience, the GUI is lacking a certain appeal that should have been accounted for by a brand that presents it self as a high end audio/tech company - this is true for both the Android and PC platforms. The pandora application specifically lacks the ability to rate a song, however; you can command Alexa to rate it for you.. so at least Amazon thought of a way to do it.
In the end, I think this product is an amazing addition to any smart home, and a great way to introduce yourself into the Sonos brand if you haven't already. The problems that I have with the product are strictly software related and can be fixed in future software/firmware updates. Hopefully Sonos as a brand will be attentive and responsive to the consumers and our feedback.

I would recommend this to a friend

Sorry, there was a problem. Please try again later.

SonosOneGuy

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

5

No Contest between Amazon's Echo and the Sonos One

Posted 11 months ago

SonosOneGuy

I got an Amazon Echo for Christmas. Not a bad product - but the sound quality was just so so. As I searched the internet for ways to possibly improve the sound quality - I dumbed into the Sonos One - with Alexa (not Sonos play1). I read many reviews and was intrigued. So I decided to purchase the Sonos One (an open box at 159.00). Whata steal! After side by side comparisons - there was no contest. The Sonos One had "knock your socks off" tight bass and mid & upper clarity. The amazon product was returned and credited without a hitch - reason for return - music quality was not as expected. You will see people bashing the Sonos One because it lacks a little of the functionality found on the Echo - Big Deal - I'll take music sound quality any day. I have Amazon Prime - and access to their music - do I really need their unlimited music for extra cost - nope! I can #via voice# control music on Amazon, Iheart, Pandora and Tunein - all at no cost. The Sonos App #available for free on all the platforms# integrates all of your music - in one place. It also allowed my to provide a location on my laptop where I had a moderate library of 2000 songs. So, I have access to more music than I can really handle. My laptop #running WIndows 8.1# sits on our kitchen peninsula and with the Sonos App - complements my voice control. If I select music on my laptop #not yet controllable via voice - but coming soon# - I still have the ability to command Alexa to play Next, Previous, Pause, and Volume. Meanwhile - I can only imagine what 2 Sonos One's paired into Stereo mode could sound like - maybe next Christmas.
Additional comments: the lack of Bluetooth has not been an issue. The music runs through our Wi-Fi wireless network #at 2.4# without a hitch and there is also the option to plug an ethernet cable into the Sonos One. The Sonos One setup was a bit involved - but only a one time thing, Advise - read the instructions and view a few Youtube videos before firing from the hip.

I would recommend this to a friend

Sorry, there was a problem. Please try again later.

Kerri

Elite Plus Member

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

4

Great sound & complicated

I have a playbase, sub, and 2 ones (with Alexa). I advise setting these up one at a time with the sonos app first and second with the Alexa app, so you can name them for later identification. Ex. Set up a playbase or sound bar first in sonos app, then set it up in the Alexa app. Continuing back and forth between apps until you set them all up.
I haven't owned the playbar, but the sound from the playbase alone is enough for surround sound. We played a surround sound test on it and it sounds amazing. It even has enough bass that you probably wouldn't need a sub, unless you prefer a lot of bass. The sub bass is ridiculous. I live in a house and we have it only half way up because it is so strong.
Pros:
Alexa enabled
Amazing sound quality
Appealing design
Plays music by voice (through Alexa) or the sonos app from amazon, spotify, and a lot more.
You can adjust music and surround sound to be softer or louder than other speakers.
The glitches can be updated to fix them.
Cons:
Couldn't get pandora to link
Doesn't have all Alexa functioning
All speakers decrease volume when talking to any Amazon's Alexa devices that are linked in your Alexa app.
Setup is a little frustrating.
If not setup properly, speakers will intermittently cut out.
Have to buy special mounts for rear speakers (expensive).
The speakers themselves are quite expensive.
The playbase doesn't look right under a larger tv. (I set mine under my entertainment center).
Can't setup more than 4 speakers (base/bar, sub, and 2 rear speakers)
The app could be better with the layout.

Even without Alexa, Sonos' speakers would be great for delivering music into every corner of your house. Not only do they sound awesome, but you can customize their audio profiles to whatever room they're in, and you can stream music from dozensFull Review

People are asking about

10 answered questions about speakers

Best answer: This speaker was brand new during the 2017 holiday season. It does not require a music subscription as it has bluetooth and wifi technology within the speaker itself. That means that you can play music from your internet connection via a computer with wifi hooked up, or with a phones data plan, both stream to the speaker.

Best answer: Alexa is integrated in the new SONOS Beam. One drawback with the 3rd party Alexa integration is, you don’t have all of the capabilities as an Echo device (drop-in, calls, etc). You also can only trigger routines, not include the speakers as part of a routine (i.e. give a single command to change your Hue lights and turn on audio in a room).

Best answer: It will depend on your setup and if you have any echo devices in the same area. I've found that the microphones pick up from a o
Good distance but not from a back room if this is your only alexa speaker.